A crappie celebration: Fish of the Week goes for catches on the ice and from open water

Bob McClanahan’s Chicago River crappie measured up. | Provided photo

Bob McClanahan with one of his winter crappie from the Chicago River.

Bob McClanahan emailed, “Thought you would like to see the winter crappie I have been catching in the Chicago River,” using minnows under a slip bobber.

He’s right, I do want to see things like that.

He’s right in that assessment, but the photo of him with his crappie is to the left.

Trevor James of Wet n Wild Outfitters messaged a photo [below, right] of of Rockford with his PB 14.5-inch crappie from the Chain O’Lakes and added, “Just after sunup, he dropped an Akara jig on a new Instigator long rod and pulled up this fish. . . . `Go, Cubs, Go.’ “

Nick Nielsen with his PB crappie from ice fishing the Chain O’Lakes.

Tyler Peterson just started building the long rods for ice fishing. (More to come on that later.)

Good thing James is smarter at the fishing business than baseball interests.

FOTW, the celebration of big fish and their stories (the stories matter, as this one shows) around Chicago fishing, runs Wednesdays in the paper Sun-Times. The online posting here at chicago.suntimes.com/outdoors goes up at varied days of the week, depending on what is going on the wide world of the outdoors.

To make submissions, email (BowmanOutside@gmail.com) or contact me on Facebook (Dale Bowman), Twitter (@BowmanOutside) or Instagram (@BowmanOutside).